Having seen that our original Updating Mandatory Profiles post is quite popular, I thought I’d follow it up with an update. The process described in the first post is quite labourious and error prone. I’d like to make people aware of how quick and easy the Profile Update Utility (PuU) makes updating a mandatory profile with ActiveSetup keys.
Here’s the new process:
- Obviously you’ll need to have downloaded (it’s free) and installed VET.
- Once installed, simply launch the Profile Update Utility.
- Select your mandatory profile by clicking the “Browse” button (step 1).
- Check the “Merge HKEY_CURRENT_USER ActiveSetup keys” checkbox (step 2).
- Click the “Go” button (step 3).
It doesn’t get much simpler than that! Note: This will merge the ActiveSetup keys from the currently logged on user. Therefore, you need to perform this action on a machine that you’ll be using the mandatory profile on.
The “Output Options” at the bottom of the PuU windows could probably do with some explaination as there is sometimes some confustion.
- Update Original Profile: Overwrites the source (Step 1) profile.
- Backup Profile: Copies the source profile (in Step 1) to a .bak file and then updates the original.
- Create New Profile: Copies the source profile (in Step 1), renames the original (in Step 1) to a .bak file and then updates the new copy.
Which option you use is up to you depending on how you manage the lifecycle of your mandatory profiles.
Enjoy – Iain
